David Mannes

Mannes, David (mănˈĭs) [key], 1866–1959, American violinist, conductor, and educator, b. New York City. Mannes was violinist in the New York Symphony Orchestra from 1891 and its concertmaster from 1898 to 1912. In 1912 he founded the Music School Settlement for Colored People and in 1916, with his wife, the Mannes Music School, both in New York City. He inaugurated free concerts in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1918. Music Is My Faith (1938) is his autobiography. His wife, Clara Damrosch Mannes, 1870–1948, b. Breslau, the daughter of Leopold Damrosch, was a pianist. A pupil of Busoni, she and her husband toured extensively in joint recitals. She was codirector with him of the Mannes Music School. Their son, Leopold Damrosch Mannes, 1899–1964, b. New York City, studied piano and composition in New York and Paris. He taught composition (1924–31) at the Mannes school and theory (1927–31) at the Institute of Musical Art (now Juilliard School of Music). In 1931 he became a research chemist with the Eastman Kodak Company and made significant contributions to the development of color photography. In 1939 he returned to the Mannes school (after 1953 known as the Mannes College of Music), subsequently becoming its president.